Brady Skjei of Rangers nearly put puck in own net in Game 1

OTTAWA -- Able to laugh about it Friday, New York Rangers defenseman Brady Skjei and goalie Henrik Lundqvist know how close they were to being embarrassed by it Thursday.

Skjei nearly scored on his own goalie at 13:42 of the second period in Game 1 against the Ottawa Senators at Canadian Tire Centre. The Rangers led 1-0 when Skjei's pass from the right side in the New York zone back to defense partner Brendan Smith in the left corner actually went on net, surprising Lundqvist and forcing him to make a stick save.

"It was just kind of a brain fart, I don't know," Skjei said. "It wasn't the best play in the world."

Skjei joked that he was just trying to keep Lundqvist on his toes and get his shot total up, even though that technically was not a shot on goal against and to that point Lundqvist already had seen 27 of the 43 shots he would face in a 2-1 loss that put the Rangers down 1-0 in the best-of-7 series.

Game 2 is here Saturday (3 p.m. ET; NBC, CBC, TVA Sports).

"No, if it would have [gone] in, I wouldn't have been laughing too hard," Skjei said. "It worked out fine. [Lundqvist] was ready, so all good."

Lundqvist said he was ready because he's experienced enough to know that when the puck is in the Rangers zone, regardless of whether they have possession, he knows anything can happen.

"Obviously sometimes you get surprised, but that just happened. It was a quick play and luckily he didn't put it in," Lundqvist said.

Skjei thanked Lundqvist during the next television timeout.

"I said, 'We both would have looked pretty stupid,'" Lundqvist said. "We can laugh about it."

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